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Video: POLITICO interviews new members

As trends go, it’s a significant one, especially as Congress wrestles with monumental budget issues that will affect government spending for decades to come and influence seemingly far-flung matters such as when the next generation can tap into Social Security and Medicare. These members of Congress — who weren’t eligible to vote for president until Bush vs. Gore at the earliest — will bring a much different cultural outlook to a Capitol building largely run by senior citizens.

And though the average age in the House is still 57, the top leaders acknowledge the youth movement afoot in Congress.

“The fact is … that everything I have done, everything in my decade now of leadership, is to elect new and younger people to the Congress,” said Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, who took offense last month to a reporter’s question about whether she should step out of leadership at age 72.

With the retirement of Rep. Dale Kildee (D-Mich.) and Republican Maryland Rep. Roscoe Bartlett’s election loss, the arrival of four new members in 2013 means this will be the first time there are more members born in the 1980s than in the 1920s. And while the 113th Congress won’t all be children of the ’80s, according to CQ Roll Call’s demographic data on the next session, 8.5 percent of House members will be younger than 40, compared with the 110th, of which 4.6 percent were.

Rep. Aaron Schock (R-Ill.) broke the born-in-the-1980s barrier in 2008, and Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) joined him in 2010.

The new members include Democrat Patrick Murphy, a 29-year-old Florida Keys native who withstood a late legal barrage from Rep. Allen West to take a newly drawn seat; Democrat Tulsi Gabbard, a 31-year-old Iraq War veteran and the youngest person ever elected to the Hawaii state Legislature; California Democrat Eric Swalwell, 32, who upset Rep. Pete Stark — nearly 50 years his senior; and Joe Kennedy, 32, baby-faced Massachusetts Democrat who fills the family lineage after a two-year gap that was the first in decades.

Murphy said he sees similarities with the 1920s-era members when it comes to fiscal issues and avoiding social debate quagmires.

“Our generation is much more of a ‘let’s get along’ generation,” he said in an interview. “We’re perhaps not as stuck in our ways.”

That doesn’t mean they won’t be reminded of their youth: Murphy said older members have already started calling him and his colleagues “you kids.” And while the “kid” caucus is still relatively small, Murphy said he thinks more younger people will start getting involved in politics.

“There’s going to be more and more of us as things move forward,” Murphy said. “It’s the beginning of a growing caucus and hopefully, a more politically active group.”

Amash, 32, one of the two Republican members in the bunch, said it’s tough at first to gain the respect of older members, but said his youth — and his use of social media — has been “helpful picking up support and respect from people on the other side of the aisle.”

“It’s hard to break into that group at first and get them to see you as an equal,” he said. “But you are representing a district just like they are, and you have ideas and you have a perspective that maybe they aren’t familiar with because of the generation gap.”

Readers' Comments (6)

The GOP is the party that is electing the most new young members of Congress. And they will continue to do so in the future. Gradually, that will attract more and more young people to conservative values as they see more and more Republicans that they identify with.

The same is true for Hispanics. As the Republicans elect more and more Hispanics (not to mention young women), they will begin to attract those votes as well. The Democrats believe they are destined to win all those votes in perpetuity, just as they have the loyalty of the black vote today. But while blacks have mistakenly bought into Dem promises, and received little in return, the young men and women, Hispanic and otherwise, are a bit more discenting.

Do you believe we should be concerned with Obamacare taking 716B out of Medicare?

Facts

1) Clinton signed law in '96 to cut gowth n Medicare expenses by cutting priary care physician Medicare payments 17% but didn't want it to start whilehe was President. It went into effect in'02.

2) Since '02 Congress has passed and te President has signed a annual one year fix to prevent these fees from dropping 17%.

3) Obamacare calls for dropping fees for doctors, hospitals, nursing homes, etc.,beginning in 2014. This is the same concept as the Clinton cuts.

So why has Obama annually signed the bill to prevent the Clinton cuts from taking effect and how will Murphy vote to prevent the Clinton cuts in 2013 or the Obama cuts listed above taking effect in 2014?

Do you believe we should be concerned with Obamacare taking 716B out of Medicare?

Facts

1) Clinton signed law in '96 to cut gowth n Medicare expenses by cutting priary care physician Medicare payments 17% but didn't want it to start whilehe was President. It went into effect in'02.

2) Since '02 Congress has passed and te President has signed a annual one year fix to prevent these fees from dropping 17%.

3) Obamacare calls for dropping fees for doctors, hospitals, nursing homes, etc.,beginning in 2014. This is the same concept as the Clinton cuts.

So why has Obama annually signed the bill to prevent the Clinton cuts from taking effect and how will Murphy vote to prevent the Clinton cuts in 2013 or the Obama cuts listed above taking effect in 2014?

“We respect youth. But they have to respect maturity and knowledge,” Lautenberg said.

That's an enormous stretch. You idiots have driven our country into the ground by loading us with debt, strangling our civil liberties and allowing the Federal Reserve to reduce the value of our currency over 98% since it's inception in 1913. We owe no respect to men who make us debt-slaves, men who don't give a damn about our rights until it's election season, blustering about the greatness of our freedom while they legislate it away.